Background change

I’ll start by saying that my attempts to get into grad school are going full force. Meaning I’m studying for (my second) GRE exam, this time the Psychology one, and I’ll be starting to write my statements of purpose (which I loathe) and all of that application-stuff so cooking, crafting and blogging are all sort of going to the wayside. I did start a craft last night that I plan on posting, but at this rate, I’m not sure when I’ll have time again to sit down and work on it. So I’ll let the suspense linger….

With that said, autumn has come to New England and I have a very love/hate relationship with it. I love the smells, the brisk air, the colors and the fact that I get to layer my clothes but it’s also a foreshadowing of winter. BUT I need to get over that, I’m not planning on moving to the tropics anytime soon so winter and I should just learn to get along.

Nothing helps changing attitudes and enjoying the change in season quite like changing your iPhones wallpaper – amiright? No, but just go with me on this. And it’s always irritating that when you google search “iPhone wallpaper” you get all of these women in bikinis. I mean, if I ever open up a guy’s phone and he has the background be a hot girl wearing skimpy clothes, I may just have him the glaring of his life.

So with that said, I found another decent site for wallpapers at (iDesign)*iPhone. They have a lot of different categories, some of which of course contain half naked girlies and I couldn’t even scroll through “paintings” because it was all sci-fi fantasy art, but some of the pictures are pretty cool. Some of my favorites are:

And more colorful options:

 

And this one which I thought was cool and was anxious to try out on my phone:

   Here’s what it looks like in use:

And yes, that’s the front screen of my iPhone in case your interested in my organization (of which I put a lot of care into).

I’ll be anxious to get some of these images come Christmas because they do have some cute holiday ones.

Oh and I should mention the blog post that I read over at design*sponge which spurred my interest in the first place. This adorable designer, Cartolina, has designed cute cards that you can text to your friends in case you want to beautiful your warm wishes and/or invites to friends. You can see images HERE. I still haven’t decided if it’s worth the $2.99 only because only two of my friends have iPhones and it’s unclear as to how this will look on regular phones, but it’s a cute idea that I think needs to further developed by others.

Well, until I blog again, enjoy.

Recipe of the week 8/23 and a new toy

A friend of mine had brought me a few goodies from her garden and one of the gems was a piece of summer squash. Normally I'm all pasta-focused, but this time I decided to go a different route and followed THIS Stuffed Summer Squash recipe. Not only was it super easy, but it was really tasty as well.

Unfortunately I have no pictures because, well, I was hungry and forgot. Opps. But it's definitely worth it and I didn't use any meat, so it was veggie-licious.

Since I lack photos of my meal, I'll post one of my new toy instead:



I finally bought a new laptop! A gorgeous macbook pro! And I'm still in shock at the deal I got, Apple doesn't offer percent off deals, but they do throw in goodies. They tossed in a free iPod touch (currently on eBay), a printer/scanner/fax machine, and I went during the Sales Tax free weekend, which saved me $100. Awesome, I know.

Also, if you like my screen saver I downloaded the Fliqlo clock HERE.

Recipe of the week, 8/16

Hello all, I’m back from a nice, busy Ohio visit. My week home was packed with a wedding, mothers & fathers day outings, trips with friends and family times.

Some photo highlights, my outing to COSI’s Titanic exhibit with my girls.

Yes, that is us on the stairs (where Jack looked oh-so-handsome in a tuxedo; I had my own oh-so-handsome moment with one of the re-enactors but we won’t go into that). The ticket behind the photo was the history of a person who was actually on the Titanic and at the end you got to find out if “you” lived or died – I lived but my fiancé and brother who went with me perished. Sad.

And for mother’s day, I surprised my mom with tickets to Wicked

I actually liked the play more than I expected. I would recommend if you’re into that sort of thing.

But I digress, I thought I wouldn’t get around to posting a recipe but I found myself with a can of artichokes and a red onion that was about to turn on me, so I decided to try an Artichoke and Olive Crostini recipe.

Not the most beautiful looking dish, but it was a nice quick and easy meal that wasn’t ultra-filling (which after being home, I’ve been seeking the lighter food options).

Paired with a rose wine and cave-aged gruyere made for a nice winding down evening meal.

And for another digression, my mom sent me a link to this girl’s Julie and Julia esq blog about re-fashioning old dresses. It’s called New Dress A Day and it’s really neat to see what can be done with a little redesign and a sewing machine. I just got one a few weeks ago and I’ve been too scared to touch it! I don’t even know if it works. I think that will be my adventure for Sunday because I keep coming up with project ideas so now is the time to put them into motion!

Recipe of the week, 7/25 + 8/1

I will be going home next week to celebrate a friend’s wedding, so I thought I’d update with a twofer. (Speaking of “toofer”, I’ve been watching 30 Rock and love that show! I need to get season 3 and 4 before it starts up again.)

So I decided to try out THIS recipe from this blog that I follow fresh365. I love to read this blog, it’s such an inspiration and her pictures are really what draw you in. She doesn’t update that much but when she does, it’s certainly worth the wait.

I was a little hesitant in trying the Strawberry and Gruyere tart because I’m normally not a big cheese and fruit combo person, but I LOVE Gruyere. If I could marry a cheese, this would be who I choose. It’s ultra expensive (as most cheeses can be), but make sure if you buy it that you spend a little more on the “Cave Aged” it sounds pretentious, but it really does make a difference. Needless to say, I only felt compelled to make this recipe because I purchased non-cave aged gruyere and realized it wasn’t worth savoring.

It did turn out rather tasty but as I said, I couldn’t handle too much of the cheese/fruit.

However, I really wanted to try the asparagus substitution that was mentioned briefly within this recipe and that turned out delicious! You just substitute asparagus, olive oil and salt+pepper instead of strawberries, honey and mint. Just go easy on the oil because the cheese offers a good amount.

I don’t know if I’d necessarily make this again because the puff pastry quickly turned from delicious to just too much buttery indulgence, but I do love the asparagus and cheese combination. Maybe next time I’ll try a quiche or tart.

See you when I get back from Ohio, which as you can see from the map, is a “a little ways” from my current location. Later!

Recipe of the Week, 7/18

Yesterday I tried my hand at a new recipe: Grilled shrimp teriyaki with pineapple.

I found the recipe HERE from this great blog called, The Pioneer Woman. She has great recipes and the SORDID DETAILS of how her and her husband met, which I stumbled upon one day and ended up reading the story in it's entirety over 2 days. It sucked me in - oh to meet a cultured cowboy.

Anyway, this recipe is super easy. For once I didn't even have to reference a recipe card which is saying something. And it tasted delicious. They were great to wrap up in a tortilla and eat them that way or to just eat them as is. But I was glad that I let the shrimp marinate overnight in the teriyaki sauce or it wouldn't have been nearly as delicious.

So to all of you naysayers who thought that I'd say I was going to do this, do one post about cookies, then forget - you were wrong. Actually I think that was just me, sorry for projecting on you.

TV: the free way

When I was getting ready to move into my new place, I did the usual calling to turn on all of the utilities which included HD cable. Then before they came out to install everything, I quickly realized that I could save around $100/month by just not having cable TV. And besides Comedy Central and the Thursday night NBC line-up, I really didn't care for TV all that much. It was the best decision that I made as I was happy just popping in my favorite TV on DVD (the usual suspects being Always Sunny or Arrested Development, in case you were wondering) when I'd sit down to eat or felt like watching something.

Then when my parents came up to visit, I knew that the shows I owned wouldn't cut it with them. They love TV and think that I'm crazy for not having it even though I ensure them that my lack of getting cable is more about my desire to read more and less about being broke.

So I was sharing all of this with a friend of mine when she offered to let me borrow her antenna and HD converter box. Remember those boxes? How in February of last year we were all going to switch from analog TV to HD and the government was giving away vouchers to get the $40something boxes? Remember how you were like, I don't care about this? Yea me too, but low and behold it is of interest to me!

After hooking up the box and antenna I found that I was able to get 8 channels - all the usual suspects (NBC, ABC, CBS, FOX), BBC news, PBS, and a couple other random ones. And after a little research into the necessary equipment, as my parents were in love with the idea of me getting this, I found out that the majority of TVs made after 2007 already are equipped with the converter so all you need to buy is an antenna. I ended up going to radioshack and for $30 bought a small, indoor antenna that works great.

I thought I'd share all of this because 1) my mom sent me THIS post which made me feel ahead of the game and 2) because we all need to save money and if you find that you're only watching the Usual Suspects and the rest of the shows on Hulu, you might as well cancel the cable and spend $30 on an antenna. Did I mention all of these channels are in HD? Sure it may cut out during a rain storm (I haven't experienced that yet), but I loooove getting things for free.

Classing up the place

I hope everyone had a nice weekend. I was very happy because my parents drove across to come visit me for a few days! We played it pretty cool, staying local except the gigantic antique market in Brimfield, MA. My parents LOVE flea markets and while this place was very cool to walk around in, it was a little too rich for our blood. The funny thing is, none of us purchased anything here although we spent 4 hours walking around the place, but on the way home we saw a roadside junk shop and we all purchased a ton of stuff! I love my family that way.

Now, onto the real reason for the post – and the actual reason for starting this blog in the first place – I did a cool little project for my apartment. I was walking around Kohls when I saw these cute little damask wall decals. Normally, I don’t like Kohls but you really can’t beat the fact that half the store is normally up to 40% off. So for only $10 I did this little project:

I began by cutting out each individual design from the roll

This extra step helps to layout the pattern before you start sticking things everywhere.

So once you’ve found a layout that you like, you can start to cut and stick. I decided to be a little more creative with this design by cutting some of the designs and placing them only from the drawers. This step is pretty easy as the designs are really easy to cut, just make sure to make straight cuts.

I even went so far as to cut a hole in one of the designs and place it around one of the knobs. This also was pretty easy and the designs are very forgiving in that they won’t show any blank spaces if you’re careful.

So now the drawer in my hallway that holds all my towels and misc items looks much more interesting!

I even had enough left over that I put some inside the door of my bar. The frosted glass gave it a cool, understated look.

A super easy project for around $10!